I spent last weekend working the SCCA Vintage event at Laguna Seca. It was a
truely sad weekend for LBC drivers. I think is was shortly after lunch that
an Elva Courier got the back end loose in turn 11, overcorrected, spun it
the other way and went straight into the wall. Lots of broken fibreglass, I
don't know the extent of the structural damage. The driver was OK.
Last race of the day a Lotus 7 went straight at turn 5. He went head-on into
the wall at speed. Another driver, who was behind him at the time said he
saw no brake lights or corrections, and thought the driver had passed out.
We later heard rumor of a stuck throttle. The driver had to be transported
to the local hospital. Later on we heard that he was going to be OK. The
race completed under a full course yellow. I got a close look at the car
later. He was lucky the car was a RHD, as the transmission was pushed back
into the left side passenger compartment. The steering wheel was bent over
and his helmet (full face fortunately) had a sizeable hole in the forehead
area. I'm surprised a 5 point harness could stretch that far.
In the area of just plain bad luck, a friend driving a Elva blew out a
freeze plug somewhere around turn 7. After a trip to town for a quick fix
plug, he found that one of the valves had hung up. No problem, just pull
the head and unstick it. On the way back together a few of the head bolts
started pulling the threads out of the block. His weekend was done.
I believe his Elva has a TR3 engine. Anyone ever heard of this problem?
50 ft. lb. shouldn't have done this. I hope he converts it over to studs.
As for myself, I spent the weekend working the black flag station. This is
usually pretty uneventful, but at Laguna there are strict sound regulations.
The first 3 or 4 mourning groups have to be under 101db,mid mourning to mid
afternoon the limit is 103db, and then it drops back to 101 for the last
couple groups. The local SCCA rule on a sound violation mechanical black
flag states that a mechanical change must be made before the car can
go back out on coures. We use a very loose interpretation of 'mechanical
change', so it usually involves vice grips, a large hammer, or some type of
deflector. You can usually see the guys with supertraps juggling red hot
plates. Keep in mind that it isn't the SCCA that is setting the limits,
but we are the ones that get stuck enforcing them. It's all because of
the $tupid rich ba$tard$ who built their million dollar homes next to
a racetrack, and than decided something needed to be done about the noise.
Of course the pro events such as Indycars and the Earle Historics get an
exemption, due to the large influx of cash to the local economy.
Other that enforcing rules that I obviously don't agree with, I had a
good time. Vintage is quite a bit more laid back that the usual club
racing event.
I also ran into fellow SOLer Chris Kantarjiev at the Lunch break.
Once we lowered our sunglasses we recognized each other.
So tell us Chris, how was your weekend out on turn X?
Tim 'I like my race cars LOUD' Pettenati
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